Alien Poster 20th Century Studios
While fictional works have a lot of incredible genres and subgenres, I believe that across genres of film and literature, science fiction (SF) is the greatest one due to its versatility, ability to portray complex themes, and cultural relevance.
Like a lot of little boys, I grew up fascinated by the greatest SF works. The heroes of comic books and the stars of action films live in such incredibly vivid and expansive worlds.
Whether it be the green tint of The Matrix, the diverse galaxy of Star Wars, or the black and blue Grid from “Tron: Legacy” I’ve always wanted to live on the other side of the screen.
As I grew older so did my love for the genre. It brought me beyond the action films I loved in my adolescence into darker territory. The decaying Los Angeles in “Blade Runner” continues to haunt and intrigue me, and Tokyo-3 of “Neon Genesis Evangelion.” And as I opened myself to the genre’s better half, I started to really understand where its strength lay.
First off, what qualifies as science fiction is flexible, giving the genre a lot of room to work in.
Of course the most famous sci-fi works are giant action movies like “Star Wars” and “Dune”, but something like “Eternal Sunshine Of The Spotless Mind” qualifies as sci-fi as well. While it’s primarily a romance, there are elements of science fiction that are vital to the plot.
That’s the beauty of the genre. While fantasy and noir films have a host of pitfalls that must be included in a story of either genre, science fiction can be as simple as “Iron Man,” where a guy in a metal suit puncheds bad guys.
It can also be complex like “Interstellar,” where a man leaves his family on a dying Earth to explore the other side of a wormhole and finds himself experiencing decades in minutes as he travels haphazardly through spacetime.
While SF might seem vapid when taken at face value, worlds like Night City in “Cyberpunk 2077” and the dozen disasters of the “Alien” franchise hold so much more than what meets the eye.
“Cyberpunk 2077” greets the player as a gorey critique of late stage capitalism, but the game proves to be an incredible hybrid of a Western, a Greek tragedy, and a samurai epic where the main character must grapple with a terminal illness, define their humanity, and leave a lasting legacy with what little time they have left to live.
Likewise, the true horror of the original “Alien” is not the deadly black organism, but rather how employees are forced to serve corporate interests against their will and knowledge, even if it kills them.It’s the kind of horror you can’t find in a more grounded story. Sometimes, to be honest, one has to be as fantastical as possible.
To capture all the horrors and truths of her time, Mary Shelley had to make necromancy seem practical, and from this her eternal ideas on life, death, the moral failings of man, and the double-edged sword of hubris still come to modern audiences as crystal clear.
Because while SF concerns a future we may never reach, it continues to say so much about our present. The characters of “Neon Genesis: Evangelion” found it impossible to connect with one another, just as people today have forgotten the virtue of empathy.
Likewise, the biggest threat to global security in the “Mission Impossible” franchise has gone from being nuclear weapons to the control of information and history, as is the case with Ethan Hunt’s battle against The Entity in 2023’s “Mission Impossible: Dead Reckoning,” reflecting how unregulated use of generative AI is beginning to hurt literacy and perception of history in America.
In the end, science fiction concerns the present as much as it does the future, and when the genre is allowed the thematic depth it was created with, it’s transformative.
Other genres can capture all these elements individually, sure, but no other medium could blend so many influences into such a powerful package that endures the erosion of time.